I've made it just after the big clash on prison island last night. My son woke up as that cut-scene played out as was seemingly mesmerized by it.(heres to hoping this may have piqued his interest to try our more single player games)

Longest quest in the history of Xenoblade because no challenge is as monumental as getting little girls not to hate each other.

I’m 13 hours in, level 26, and still have yet to reach the Ether Mines. This is the first time this game can be 100 percented without having a really shitty experience following a walk through.

So I'm guessing the original version didn't have the sidequest tracking feature (which I love!)

Nope. You have no idea how painful it was to find some random item floating on some point of the map without any help xD

No. It was fucking horrendous to keep track. So I gave up after a few and only did the Colony 6 rebuild. Everything else could suck it esp finding an item one. It's such a godsend now.

nvm. edit. spoiled it. my bad old habits

Awesome, hope you're liking it so far?

As for the physics of the Bionis I always thought it had to have its own gravity to make the whole thing viable otherwise there's just not enough places where its horizontal enough for the places we traverse to exist, haha.

Upon seeing a recommendation from a video I reconfigured my buttons so that I can scroll through arts with ZR and ZL. Really much better IMO (mapped ZR to right stick click for those wondering).

And I could now actually fight things a few levels above me, so I no longer feel inadequate. Dunno what I was doing wrong in the beginning.

Just bought this game and while not a full on overhaul it is more of a substancial upgrade than the zelda remasters on Wii U. Textures and lighting upgraded although no dynamic shadow maps, character models redone for the main cast but polygons barely touched for NPC's and environments. Particle and water effects improved but stiff awkward wii era animations remain. Overall it sits in between a simple remaster and full blown remake and although the resolution is a dynamic 720p it somehow looks a lot cleaner and sharper than the resolution suggests, pixel quality over pixel count i guess. Anyway i am rooting for the switch effect of pushing a franchise into uncharted sales territory, hope this game can exceed 2.5m lifetime.